D3 Publisher has announced that they will be bringing Shade‘s unique third-person shooter called Bullet Girls Phantasia to English audiences on PC through Steam sometime in early 2020. Originally released back in 2018 in Japan for the PlayStation 4 and PS Vita with no seeming chance of a localization, this marks the first appearance of the game on PC. While no price for Bullet Girls Phantasia was revealed so far, the company did reveal some gameplay details.
Players will take control of fourteen different characters to battle against enemies using swords, magic, and firearms but if they are hit, their armor will be destroyed. An announcement trailer and some screenshots were also revealed alongside this reveal and can be found below.
A new trailer and set of screenshots for Langrisser I & II has been released by NIS America and this time around the focus is placed solely on Langrisser I and its story and characters. In Langrisser I, there was a terrible war long ago over a legendary sword said to grant its wielder unlimited power. The blood of those who vowed to protect it and those who sought its power for themselves permeated the battlefields of El Sallia. That sword is known as Langrisser. Of those who swore to protect it, the royal family of Baldea has safeguarded it from the world for many generations. Thanks to Baldea, tales of Langrisser soon faded from memory.However, Baldea’s sworn duty would be called to action once again.
Motivated by power and the conviction to rule the world, Kaiser Digos and the Dalsis Empire he commanded invade Baldea, seeking the enticing power of Langrisser. Ledin, the prince of Baldea, narrowly escapes the invasion, and devises a way to avenge his father, who had been killed by Kaiser Digos.Now, Ledin must reclaim Langrisser, which his ancestors fought so valiantly to protect—thus beginning his journey that will test his loyalty to the Light.
You can check out the trailer and screenshots below while the game itself is set to be released in North America on March 10, 2020 for the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch with Europe getting the game on March 13, 2020.
It has been some time since the gaming world last saw the Super Monkey Ball series and even then it was only through handheld devices did the series continue to live over the past decade. Now Sega has revisited the series by taking the 2006 Wii release of Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz and modernizing it a bit in a remastered release that removes the motion controls that the Wii used but holds true to a number of other additions that were made back in the day. With Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD being a mix of changed features and a classic game, is it worth visiting once more?
Gameplay
Players are given a number of different primates to choose from, or even a certain hedgehog once unlocked, that have a variety of different stats that determine how fast they can role and how high the can jump, and then toss that monkey into a capsule that will roll through a hundred different levels spread across ten different worlds. For the most part the style of gameplay remains the same as before, roll the monkey of your choice through a hazardous stage and reach the goal without falling off too many times.
What has changed is the way the game’s controls work, for both better and worse. Rather than relying on motion controls, players now have far more precise control thanks to the use of the analog stick. Now for those unfamiliar with the series, players don’t have direct control of the monkey ball but instead are tilting the stage that it rolls on, and this analog movement can allow for some high levels of finesse when maneuvering around a difficult stage which is a real delight. Along those same lines though the return of the jumping mechanic also comes into play and feels like a double-edged sword.
Jumping in Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD is a simple affair, as it is handled with a single button press, but also a complicated one. On one hand, some stages that players can tackle are trivialized through jumping properly but on the other hand stages that require specific jumps or rely heavily on platforming can be a disaster to approach. This is thanks to the odd decision to give the player zero control over the camera which is instead locked a set distance behind the monkey ball. This leads to trying to jump in a 3D space often being more of a leap of faith than anything else and far too many failures and restarts as a result. To make matters worse, this uncontrollable camera can also lead to some incredibly disorienting moments where it will whip around to hold position on a rapidly moving ball changing directions at high speed.
While this does work to create a nice bit of a challenge at times, this challenge often feels more like battling game design than the actual levels themselves. In fact, players will find that Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD struggles with finding a sweet spot for its difficulty curve as the initial half of the game features plenty of simplistic stages that players can blitz through, especially if they have played an entry in the series before, only for it to spike heavily near the end. A bit past the halfway point a sweet spot is managed where players will feel challenged and rewarded for conquering a difficult stage only for levels past the three quarter mark to be brutally difficult that make it far more frustrating than enjoyable and while this challenge is something that eventually does feel rewarding once completed, a smoother curve would have been nice.
At the end of every world players will find themselves facing off against a boss creature. Bosses generally play out the same way with players needing to target a weak spot on their body and jump into it all while trying to avoid being knocked off of the stage. Once again thanks to the lack of camera control many of these boss battles feel far more annoying than actually difficult and can lead to a few “late game” being a breeze compared to a few earlier ones simply due to these systems.
Outside of the core single player mode players will have access to time trials as well as a number of multiplayer mini-games though the number has been drastically cut down this time around. As opposed to the fifty that were found in the original game Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD instead provides only ten, though it is clear that these are probably the best mini-games that worked without the Wii’s motion controls. What is on offer here are a mix of some great games, especially Monkey Target, and a few duds that don’t hold much value and still control terribly. That being said, there is a decathlon mode that allows players to go through all ten mini-games in a row if they want to but this mode only drives home how bad some of them happen to be.
Visuals & Audio
Thanks to the colorful and cartoonish style of the original release Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD manages to clean up quite well for modern consoles. The character designs for the various monkeys are memorable while bosses are unique enough looking while the stages have a nice crisp feeling to them with there being plenty of variety throughout the hundred stages that they rarely feel repetitive outside of the initial world.
It is odd to see, though understandable due to possible licensing issues, but many of the game’s original songs have been changed in this release. The music that has replaced these tracks are solid enough but don’t quite live up to the original pieces. This is noticeable whenever a classic track that was kept intact plays and is noticeably better than the newer pieces.
Overall
Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD struggles with finding a balance between providing a challenge and being fun at the same time while trimming back on some of the extra content that may have made it more worthwhile. While there are moments of greatness that see the fast paced gameplay work amazingly alongside the player’s new precise controls over the stage, these moments are few and far between in a game that feels a bit barebones and a rather odd choice considering the other games in the series that could have been given the HD treatment.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
After more than their fair share of leaks Capcom has officially announced at Sony’s State of Play that Resident Evil 3 is on the way and will be released worldwide on April 3, 2020 for the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC as well as including the previously announced Resident Evil Resistance as part of the package.
In Resident Evil 3, S.T.A.R.S. member Jill Valentine, flees a city being consumed by zombies and other horrifying creatures. Built with Capcom’s proprietary RE Engine, Resident Evil 3 uses modernized gameplay to combine action with classic survival horror in vivid high-definition.
Jill’s harrowing experiences in Resident Evil 3 take place in the nightmarish hours leading up to and following the events in Resident Evil 2, shedding new light on the plight of Raccoon City’s residents. Every hope of escape is cut off by another star in the Resident Evil franchise: the towering Bio Organic Weapon Nemesis. This brutal yet intelligent monstrosity uses an arsenal of high-powered weaponry to indiscriminately eliminate any surviving S.T.A.R.S. members in the city–with Jill being his final target.
A yet to be priced “Premium Collector’s Edition” will be relesed alongside the standard edition and include a physical copy of the game, a statue of Jill Valentine, a printed art book, double sided Raccoon City map/wall poster, and a digital soundtrack and those who pre-order the game in general will receive classic costumes.
During Sony’s State of Play Square Enix announced that they were once again working with Platinum Games to release a new action game by the name of Babylon’s Fall. Details about the game’s plot are slim but the company did announce that the game is being developed for the PlayStation 4 as well as the PC with a planned release sometime in Summer 2020.
Accompanying this announcement came a teaser trailer that gives us an early look at the “fluid action gameplay” and the new “Brushwork Filter” that is used to provide the game with a unique art style that will hopefully be touched up in the future.
Earlier this year Illfonic Games announced that they were working with Sony to bring Predator: Hunting Grounds to the PlayStation 4 and now the developer has announced at Sony’s State of Play 2019 that not only do they have a release date for the game but that it will also be releasing on the PC through the Epic Games Store on the same day.
Predator: Hunting Grounds will be released on April 24th with early pre-order bonuses including the original ’87 Predator Skin as well as early acess to the “Ole Painless” mini-gun. Those who want to pay a bit more can get the Digital Deluxe Edition that will award the player some other not yet detailed bonus items as well as a digital copy of the Predator: Hunters comic from Dark Horse Comics.
To go along with this announcement a new gameplay trailer and some screenshots were also released showing off customization and the new female Predator and can be found below.
Spike Chunsoft has had some surprising news today to celebrate Steins;Gate‘s tenth anniversary as not only has the company announced that the spin-off Steins;Gate: My Darling’s Embrace has been immediatly released on the PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, and PC but also that Steins;Gate 0 is also now available on the Nintendo Switch at a temporary 10% discount.
Steins;Gate: My Darling’s Embrace is a spin-off dating visual novel that is set in an alternate reality where life is peaceful and he can get to know all six heroines and work towards a romantic ending with each of them. Steins;Gate 0 lets players experience an alternate timeline that was only touched upon in the original game.
Trailers and screenshots for both games can be found below.
For many years now Sony has had a tight grip on the MLB license, making it so only smaller baseball games could be released on other platforms but that appears to be changing as Major League Baseball, the Major League Baseball Players Association, and Sony have announced a multi-year extension to continue developing MLB The Show and what makes this one interesting is that, perhaps thanks to MLB’s pushing, the game will now also be moving to additional console platforms beyond the PlayStation starting in 2021.
It is worth noting that while no actual platform announcements were made alongside this reveal both Microsoft and Nintendo have already reacted to the news in public. Currently MLB The Show 20 is set to be released on March 17, 2020 for the PlayStation 4 with the (as a Chicagoan) now lowly Chicago Cubs taking the cover position.
The new box art for Final Fantasy VII Remake has been revealed by Square Enix and with it comes a notice that the game will be a PlayStation 4 exclusive until March 3, 2021. It is interesting to note that, outside of a few rumors in the past, that so far the game has only ever been announced for the PlayStation 4.
This does mean that fans with either Xbox One consoles or on PC may have a chance to play the game on their preferred platform once that timed exclusivity runs out but it will likely be some time before the developer announces more regarding their plans outside of the PlayStation 4.
After being leaked last week Sega has now officially announced that they will be releasing Bayonetta & Vanquish 10th Anniversary Bundle for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One with the game being released both physically and digitally for both platforms on February 18, 2020 with the bundle priced at $39.99 or individually for $24.99.
The retail release of the game will include a Steelbook case that shows off brand new cover art for both games and both titles will run at 4K resolution and at 60 frames per second when played on the PlayStation 4 Pro and Xbox One X. To go along with this announcement the company has released a trailer and you can check it out below.
